Brandon and Savannah: World Travelers?

Sometimes I think about what we're about to do and I realize it is only because of God's providence and his specific call on our lives. Savannah and I aren't really in the same mold that a lot of missionaries tend to come from. Well, at least the people in college that were on the missions program. We aren't the most well-traveled people in the world you see.

Savannah was born and lived in the same small town in North Carolina her whole life. She had the same classmates in school from kindergarten to her senior year in High School. College was her first real adventure you could say. I moved quite a bit when I was younger, and had my fair share of first days at a new school. But for the most part I was from Florida, I liked Florida and I planned on living in Florida for the rest of my life.

I had a job that required quite a bit of traveling at one time in our marriage. One time I had to spend a week in Philadelphia for a conference and Savannah went with me. We didn't have a lot of Big City experience. I've been to a few, and so had Savannah, but it was still quite an experience. Everyone was in a hurry and if you were at a fast food place and didn't know what you wanted right away, the cashier and the person behind you would yell at you at the same time. If you walked over the vents in the street, you would get a gust of warm air that smelled like cheeseburgers but not in a good way.

One day out of that week I skipped an afternoon session of the conference to do some sight seeing. We underestimated the size of Philadelphia, and by the time we saw the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall and all that, we had walked about 4 miles and we then realized we had to walk four more miles back. It was July and we were really hot and tired by the time we got back. I was pretty much crawling into the hotel, which might speak to my current physical fitness level.

One night while we were there we were watching the news and someone was reporting about a murder that happened that day and the place where it happened was somewhere we walked right by earlier that day. It freaked us out a little bit, and we decided wherever we were planning on going that night suddenly didn't sound as fun as going to the hotel pool.

I guess the point of all this rambling is that we are both silly and ridiculous. We are ill-formed tools to perform the work that God has called us to. We are so thankful that that doesn't matter. We know that He will shape us and help us grow and that all the work that's coming is His work, not our work. All we have to do is let Him do it. We leave for our first trip to Verona in about 9 days. We will be silly and ridiculous there too, and we could not be more excited about it. God has put a fire in our hearts for a place we haven't been to yet. He's put a yearning in our spirits for a people we haven't' met and we wouldn't even be able to talk to yet. He provides the will to do it, the desire to want it, and the strength to accomplish it. The best part is He likes doing all of these things with ridiculous people.

-Brandon and Savannah